Fourteenth International Conference on the Arts in Society

Abstract

This paper concerns a collaborative arts-based endeavour between a community project (SAOL) for women affected by addiction and poverty in Dublin inner city and undergraduate nursing students in Dublin City University (DCU). This initiative was informed by calls for more meaningful collaboration with service users in health/social care practitioner education as well as the recognition of the value of narrative and art-based pedagogical approaches in such educational contexts. The SAOL community created a series of photographic images based on the findings of a community survey regarding public perceptions of poverty. This was followed by a collaborative learning workshop with student nurses and the women from SAOL, discussing the photographs and sharing stories and perceptions of poverty, mental health issues and substance use. This collaboration extended to the planning and staging of an exhibition; Object Poverty, at a range of formal venues as well as street exhibitions in Dublin city. The exhibition involved the display of the photographic exhibits accompanied by the rich responses from the workshop group and public audiences on themes and experiences of poverty. The paper discusses the process and merits of arts-based collaboration among this diverse learning group as a means of configuring and communicating complex experiences, supporting equality, promoting shared understandings and challenging stereotype and stigma. The benefits and challenges for participants involved will be considered and well as implications and opportunities for education and community arts practice.